I
wrote "The
Day the Sun & Moon Stood Still" to
show how absurd
the Biblical story of Joshua’s conquering of the “Promised Land” is
from a scientific perspective. Mainly I deal with the story in the 10th
chapter of the book of Joshua that says during
Israel's battle against the Amorites God caused the
Sun and
Moon to stand still for about a day (Jos.10: 1 - 15).

The
reference notes in the text can be viewed on screen by clicking
on the numeral text references. After you have
read the
endnote you can click on the endnote numeral
and you will return to the original area of
text.

Welcome
to the Reading Room!
The Day the Sun
& Moon
Stood Still

The Exodus

The
biblical stories about Moses
gaining the freedom of the Israelites from the Pharaoh are
famous but
Egyptologists have not found a single supportive inscription. The Bible
claims there
were over 600,000 males alone plus a mixed multitude and many herds of
animals
that joined them in the so-called exodus (Exodus
12: 37– 38). People have advanced various estimates as
per how large a
group this implies. Some put it to over a million people
and perhaps even
two. This huge crowd supposedly wandered as nomads for 40 years in the
wilderness. They would have moved very slowly and should have trampled
down
anything in their path and left miles of waste in their wake.
Despite a number of searches in the desert no one had ever
found a trace of evidence.

Everyday,
such a large horde would need the equivalent
of a few hundred large tanker trucks of water plus several tons of
food. Their
supplies would have quickly run out and the Sinai couldn’t have
possibly
sustained them. The writer(s) tried to solve the problems by appealing
to
miracles but left out many details. Moses on one occasion
turned bitter water sweet (Exodus 15)
and another time struck a rock
with his staff to get water (Exodus
17).
These events are depicted within the first few months of their
journey but
they needed daily water for forty years. There is
also the story
of the supernatural bread called Manna which supposedly fed the people
until
they got to the borders of Canaan (Exodus 16:35).
However there isn't
any mention of how the herds were fed. Miracles aside, only
small groups
guided by experienced nomads stand a chance to survive in that rugged
terrain
and harsh climate. The biblical account is so doubtful it
borders on the
absurd.

The Joshua Anomaly

The Bible indicates the leadership of
the conquest of Canaan
was left up to Moses’ protégé Joshua.
However, there also isn’t any evidence that Joshua led the Israelites
in a
large scale invasion of Canaan or that Jericho
and other nearby cities were destroyed in this time frame. Large parts
within
this general area were not even settled at the time of their arrival.
Small
groups of people probably arrived from different regions and found much
uninhabited land. They then joined together and formed communities and
over
time became known as Israelites. [1]

In any case we pick up the biblical
story when
the Israelites battled the Amorites. What is said to have
happened is much
more than the customary priestly blessing of the troops, practiced by
many
tribes, before a battle. It appears the Israelite God, (known by
different
names such as “Elohim” [2]“Yahweh,” [3] or “Yahweh Elohim”) was concerned
with the real estate as
he wanted his chosen people to win the battle and take the land. The
incredible
account claims that God caused the Sun and Moon to stand still in the
sky for
almost an entire day (Jos.
10:1 – 15). I
will refer to this as the “Joshua
anomaly.”
Presumably
it was to give the Israelites more daylight to catch the fleeing
Amorites. It
shows Yahweh not only plays favorites amongst people but is also a
tribal god
of war who directly intervened in the battle. It seems his unbelievable
action
tipped the scales very much in the favor of the Israelites!

If this really happened it
would have been an
incredible astronomical sight clearly visible via the naked eye to
people all
over the world. The other side of the issue is if there was more
daylight on
the sun-side of the earth, there had to have been a longer night on the
other
side. In other words strangely the sun didn’t appear to rise as
expected and it
wasn’t due to cloud cover. You really have to wonder why there aren’t
any known
collaborative accounts. There should be a large number of them but we
haven’t
found another such account! [4]

This is only the beginning of
difficulties. The Sun and
Moon’s gravitation cause the ocean tides but the
Moon is responsible
for about 70% of the action. However it’s really the dynamics
of the
angles of the two bodies that determine the overall tidal ebbs and
flows (See Figures
1 - 4). There
are two high tides daily, one on the lunar side of the Earth
and the other
on its opposite side and there are also corresponding low tides. If the
Moon
suddenly ceased orbiting Earth; that is “stood still in the
sky,” it would
have suddenly frozen the tides at the point of stoppage. Since
water is a
liquid, it is readily drawn by the gravity of the two bodies. During
the Joshua
anomaly there would have been more time to draw water and it should
have
resulted in unusually high tides. In some areas it should have caused
some
inland flooding. The corresponding low tides in other areas
should have
been lower than normal. Imagine the shock of seaside peoples when they
noticed
their local tides were not behaving normally!

The extent of these effects would
depend on the angles of
the three bodies at the time of the stoppage (See
Figures 1 – 4).
However since the account
claims that both bodies stood still, it is reasonable to assume it
occurred
during a time when the Moon was visible in daylight. If it wasn’t
visible to
the armies why mention it? The Moon is never visible in daylight during
Spring
Tides which are times when there is either a New Moon or a Full Moon
(the
Sun/Moon angle is 180 degrees). It is most visible during Neap
Tides when the Moon is either in its
first or third quarter (the Sun/Moon angle is 90 degrees). During Neap
Tides,
high tides aren’t as high as Spring Tides but during the Joshua anomaly
tides
should have been much higher and correspondingly lower than normal.

The Joshua anomaly should have also
influenced the jet
stream and the ocean currents having at least a temporary impact on
weather
patterns. There should have been numerous sudden and very violent
storms.
Further, when the Moon (and apparently the Sun) resumed their normal
action there should have also been a tremendous amount of
water shifting
around causing giant or even tidal waves that added to the destruction.
The
events of such a strange day should have caused many people
to record
all of the details but there aren’t any such
accounts. However, everything
I have said thus far is only the tip of the iceberg. The story, as we
shall
see, requires the suspension of the force of gravity and many other
laws of
physics. This is seer nonsense.

One of gravity’s key effects is it
causes things to move
relative to other things. We know that the Earth, for example, orbits
the Sun.
This of course indicates that Yahweh should
have ordered the Earth and not the Sun to stand still. Most pre-scientific peoples thought
the Earth was static,
meaning it is stationary. We see this in the Joshua anomaly as the Sun
is
assumed to orbit around a static Earth. The idea the Earth is
“unmovable” is
also expressed in the Book of Psalms. [5] Yet it is inconceivable to some
people how the Bible could
be wrong about such matters. Those who comment often ignore the
troubling
astronomy and focus only on the miracle. Others invent a stretched interpretation
which implies it only refers to what was apparent to
pre-scientific
observers. It makes one wonder why God didn’t simply
straighten them out. If
an early revelation of planetary motion was later confirmed it would
have been
a really big deal! No matter how one tries to interpret the account the
physics/astronomy, as we will see, renders it all impossible.

Our world undergoes numerous motions
(see my essay “The
Motions of Our World”) but the one that is directly related
to the Joshua
anomaly is the daily spinning or revolving of our planet
on its axis. In order
to make the Sun to appear as if it stood
still, you need to stop
the earth from revolving since this creates the illusion
that things
visible in the sky revolve around us. [6] Any such event is fraught with
difficulties. Newton’s
first law
requires that if a force causes something to move, it continues until
another
force acts to stop or alter it. Most things that move slow down due to
gravity
and kinetic interactions, friction being another chief factor. In the
Joshua
anomaly we have to imagine that somehow our planet’s spin was suddenly
and
instantly stopped. This is impossible and we will see why
momentarily. [7] The second feature in the story is to
make the moon stand
still in the sky. There isn’t any good way to do this indirectly. The
movement
of the moon in the sky is another illusion. It’s created by the moon’s
opposite
orbital direction compared to earth’s rotation. Both bodies really move
in
different directions but the Earth’s fast spin makes the Moon appear to
orbit
the way we see it, opposite to its real direction. All you have to do is slow the earth’s
rotation enough until
the moon appears to stand stillbut the planet must keep
spinning. [8] This is counter to what must be done to
make the sun appear
to be stationary. In the later case the earth can’t revolve.
Independent
actions are required to create both illusions.
We know the moon orbits the earth and if anyone claims it stopped we
have the
same problems we would encounter if the Earth stopped orbiting the Sun.
Since
the movement of planets around stars and moons about planets
is caused
by gravitation between the bodies, it must somehow be
cancelled. This
is also scientifically impossible.

Some
true believers might think
God miraculously cancelled the earth/moon gravitational interaction,
meaning
the bodies maintained mass but no longer interacted. I can’t tell you
how crazy
this sounds! The moon orbits or “free falls” around the earth and if
their
attraction were suddenly nullified the moon would continue moving and
would
leave the vicinity of our planet. The chance of it being captured by
another
planet is low. It is more probable it would be captured by the sun’s
more
powerful gravity, perhaps pulled in and even absorbed. Most likely it
would
eventually settle into a new solar orbit and act as small
planet. [9] If it made it to the outer
solar system it could take
on a long periodic solar orbit much like some comets. It could also
escape the
solar system and become a wandering rogue moon.

Okay, we’re supposed to simply accept all of this as another one or a
series of
Yahweh’s miracles. We have to imagine the earth stopped spinning and
moon
suddenly stopped on a point in its orbital path and yet the rest of the
laws of
physics still applied. If all of this happened in an instant there
should have
been humongous kinetic, geological, oceanic and meteorological
consequences.

What If it Happened
Today?

Let’s imagine the Joshua anomaly
happened today, only let’s
make it a little more interesting and say the changes
were permanent. Newton’s laws
of motion
dictate that things keep moving even when a carrier body stops. It’s
like a car
accident. If you run into a tree your car bends and buckles as its
molecules/materials continue to thrust forwards due to their momentum.
Things
continue to buckle and break up until they completely stop. The
buckling,
bending, breaking and flying debris occur between the point of initial
impact
and what you could call the points of stoppage. This is an inclusive
interval [10]within which the damage
occurs to vehicles, people and other things. In our scenario, things
would
continue to surge forwards at a slowing but still fast velocity (nearly
1,000
miles per hour) even though the planet suddenly stopped. There would be
collisions amongst and between moving things and moving things and
those which
are very firmly grounded. In short, we are looking at billions of
collisions
occurring almost at once, certainly within a very small interval of
time. Even some of our upper atmosphere including the
protective ozone
could be torn away from the planet only to dissipate in the coldness of
space

There
are two main factors
that would trigger worldwide earthquakes. Firstly and mainly the sudden
stoppage would cause a shift in the earth’s plates creating worldwide
earthquakes like
we’ve never seen. Secondly when the planet stopped spinning it would
reel-in
its centrifugal force that tends to cause things to bulge outwards. It
would
cause an instant inbounding effect followed quickly by a rebound. This
would
also stress the earth’s plates and add to the generation of
earthquakes. Of
course all of thiswould create new fissures in
the earth’s crust or
aggravate older ones creating pathways for pressurized molten magma to
erupt
to the surface as volcanoes. Giant waves or tsunamis also often follow
in the
wake of earthquakes due to flexing earth plates underwater. Many
mountain and hill
tops would crumble creating gigantic snow and landslides. When these
events
occur at sea shores they can also trigger tsunamisdue
to the sudden
influx of
material displacing large amounts of water. Much of the ice locked up
in
glaciers and in ice sheets at the polar caps would also fracture and
break up.

Our
planet spins in an
easterly direction. When it stopped it would also eliminate
the planet’s other
rotational derivative called the Coriolis Effect. It influences the
prevailing
winds and the rotation of oceanic currents and these would instantly
change. More importantly the sudden
stoppage of the spin of our planet would instantly reroute the jet
stream and cause winds to blow mainly
in an easterly direction at almost 1,000 miles per hour. These massive
winds
would blow all around the world as if were engulfed bya
massive
hurricane.
Just to make a comparison the highest wind
speeds recorded in
hurricanes are
less than 200 miles per hour. Now we have toimagine
aworldwidestorm
five times as powerful. The resulting friction
alone would be
stupendous, causing a rapid rise in worldwide temperatures.

The worldwide storm would go on and
on. In its wake most of
the remaining infrastructure of cities would be destroyed; many
buildings,
electrical lines, plumbing, dams, bridges, nuclear power stations, etc.
would
be damaged or even break up. Many cars, trucks, trains, dead bodies and
other
things would be flung into the air, not to mention the broken glass,
plastic,
stones and many other kinds of debris. Even some of the largest trees
would
snap or be ripped out of the ground and smaller ones flung into the
air. There
would also be worldwide devastating fires but some of these would be
quenched
by massive rainfall and floods.

There would no longer be a 24 hour day
consisting of about
12 hours of light and 12 of night. Now day and night would be governed
by the
earth’s yearly orbit around the sun. The part of the planet facing the
sun
would experience six months of perpetual sunlight and would be flooded
by
damaging ultra violet rays. The opposite side would have six months of
darkness
but this would shift on a yearly basis. The demarcation line
between the
hot/cold sides would create a wide shadow area stimulating numerous
cyclones or
hurricanes.Many of these would probably
quickly break up due
to the greater power of the worldwide storm. Normally storms wind down
due to
factors such as friction from the land but the shadow area
would act as an
engine to perpetuate the worldwide storm. On the sun-side of
the planet
the oceans would also experience a continual solar high tide as would
the
opposite area on the night-side. (See my essay “The Motions of Our World”
for a more complete discussion on how tides operate).

There
would also be a long term
problem that stemmed from a disruption in the Earth’s magnetosphere. It
is
earth’s magnetic field that deflects the deadly cosmic rays from our
sun and
elsewhere. Without its protection the radiation over time would kill
surface
forms of life. We still aren’t certain as per all the details of how
the
magnetosphere is generated but we know rotation plays an important role
in machines
called dynamos that generate electricity and magnetic fields. As our
planet
spins so does the solid inner core and the secondary molten core that
consists
of ionized plasma. No one knows what would happen to the magnetosphere
if the
planet suddenly stopped rotating but Professor Jeremy Bloxham
of HarvardUniversity
who studies the magnetosphere
claims that if its cause were somehow turned off today the field would
stay
active for perhaps 1500 years. [11]

In any case after the field shut
down the cosmic rays that act like a solar wind would constantly blow
particles
of the upper atmosphere off into outer space. In the process the
worldwide windstorm
would gradually subside as the gases in the atmosphere dissipated. Over
time the
surface water would also vaporize and be lost. There could still be
some
remnants of ice at the poles but the prolonged summers would also tend
to melt
it during the flexing six month periods of daylight. In the end earth
would
become a Mars-like planet that lost most of its atmosphere and liquid
surface
water after its magnetic field shut down. [12]

In
the long term only some of the tiniest forms of life such as microbes
in
underground pools of hot water or encased inside rocks [13] might survive. Perhaps some microbes
at the bottom of what
was left of oceans near volcanic vents might survive for a time but
only those
that made it deeper underground could last after the oceans dissipated.
Such
forms of life have been found in extreme conditions on earth and it
gives
scientist the hope that we may eventually also find them on Mars and in
other
places in our solar system.

The Last Survivors

Now
let’s back track and look at
who might be the longest-lived humans in our scenario. Shortly after
the
anomaly some underground miners and other workers along with a
relatively small
number of people in underground shelters might survive for a time. They
would
have lost all public electrical power and communications. The miners
would lose
power to their damaged elevators and have to climb ladders in emergency
shafts
to try to come to the surface. Surface conditions would be intolerable;
everything would be destroyed, massive winds and climbing temperatures.
It
would force them back underground probably even before they made it all
the
way. The temperature would also increase underground since mines get
air from
the surface. Of course most mines also get their electrical power from
the
surface and it would be inoperable. Without power for air conditioning,
blowers
and fans it would spell certain doom. They would have to rely on stored
food,
water, batteries and fuel for powering any underground generators, etc.
Some
places on the sun-side of the planet might have electricity producing
surface
solar cells with lines that take the power underground but even these
would be
ineffective due to the haze and dust in the air blocking out sunlight.
In due
time supplies and power sources would run out and all of the remaining
electrical power systems would fail. There wouldn’t be anyone who could
rescue
them and people would die in the terrible heat and underground darkness.

Any
underground survivors
on the night-side of the planet who were able to somehow observe
surface
conditions would only see constant darkness but in some areas there
would be
some sporadic colored lights generated by massive displays of the
Aurora
Borealis in the northern hemisphere and the Aurora Austral-is in the
southern
hemisphere. Where these would be strongest depends on the flow of
cosmic rays.
In any case in a very short time there would be very few humans left
alive in
mines and underground chambers.

If there were
submarine crews
undersea they would have also
lost almost all communications. It’s practically a total black out.
With some
luck some crews might succeed in communicating with
those in other subs
via orbiting satellites. They might initially think they were
in a local
giant storm but why weren’t they alerted? Depending on which side of
the planet
they were on, they would be baffled when they noticed the sun either
didn’t set
or rise as expected.

Nuclear powered submarines are much longer ranged
than older classes of submarines. Their nuclear generators do not
absorb air
like the diesels engines used to power up batteries in the older types
of
submarines. [14] This is the reason they can stay
undersea for so much
longer. Luckily some modern nuclear submarines do not need to be
refueled
during their entire 25 year life span but the crew still needs to eat
and drink
and supplies must be replenished. They might think about risking a
landing to
find supplies but it would be all but impossible. Some of
them would no
doubt continue to believe there must be places where surface conditions
could
still sustain life. These submariners would have many things to
consider. In
addition to the intolerable surface conditions there would
be numerous damaged nuclear power plants. It means
there would
be many Chernobyl-like places where lethal radiation would be
flooding out
into the environment adding to the extreme dangers.

Navigation would also become
increasingly difficult. Some
or all global positioning system satellites (GPS) could eventually be
knocked
out by cosmic radiation especially during solar storms. If the
magnetosphere
were to act erratically compasses could at times also
become less
reliable but if so it would add to the clues that something very
strange and
devastating had occurred. The storms would rage for years and the crews
would
run out of food and vital supplies. They would probably be amongst the
last
humans to perish.

If there were astronauts in orbiting
space craft they would
suddenly lose contact with ground control. Then they would notice all
the lights
on earth shutting down due to damaged power stations and electrical
grids. It’s
also possible that their detectors could show spikes of higher level
cosmic
rays again assuming the magnetosphere weakened or fluxed. They would
notice the moon wasn’t
moving and the sun wasn’t even raising and setting on earth. Strangely
the
planet isn’t even rotating; they wouldn’t believe what they were
seeing. They
would probably maneuver their craft into different positions/orbits in
the
attempt to better see/detect signs of life and to try to determine what
happened. There would be clear signs that a worldwide storm was
brewing. They
would still be dumbfounded. They might as well be locked in an episode
of Rod
Serling’s “The
Twilight Zone.”

The astronauts would also
eventually
conclude trying to make
a landing without any aid from ground services amidst the storm would
be
suicidal. It would be chancy but dying in space when supplies and fuel
ran out
also isn’t very appealing. It would be a terrible decision; one can
only
imagine the drama. After the shock, much discussion and even arguments,
they
would simply have to accept there probably isn’t any safe place to
land. In any
case it would amount to deciding where they were going to die. When
their
supplies ran out they would face starvation on board or they could try
landing
but it would be certain death in the 1,000 miles per hour winds.

Back to the Bible

Now,
from all of this, you can
imagine the devastation the Joshua anomaly should have caused. The
instant the
earth stopped spinning the invading Israelites, the fleeing Moabites,
and
almost all of the surface life would have been wiped out. Then the
story
requires that, after about a day, the sun and moon appeared to
move
normally again. Now we have to imagine the earth’s spin being kick
started.
Normally we don’t feel the movement of the planet as its acceleration
is
constant. It’s like being on an airplane, for example, when it has
reached its
cruising speed you can take off your seat belt, get up and even walk
around. If
there isn’t any turbulence it seems just as if you were at rest. But
now we
have to imagine the planet starting to spin from zero and accelerating
up to
over 1,000 miles per hour. [15]This is double
trouble. Have you ever experienced
acceleration on a roller coaster, fast car or airplane? When seated and
belted
you feel as if you are being pushed back into your seat. If you were
standing
you could be flung right off your feet. Speeding up the planet
to its
constant spin velocity would cause even more devastation. If there were
any
survivors they would dread the day the sun and moon stood still. By now
you’ve
probably seen how ridiculous all of this really is. Thankfully the
story is
clearly a myth.
There is also a similar myth in II Kings. This is the story of King
Hezekiah
who had fallen ill. Isaiah the prophet visited him and told him he was
going to
die but as he was leaving “the word of God” came to him. Yahweh had
heard the
king’s prayer and saw his tears and he was going to heal him. Isaiah
was told
to take a lump of figs and place it on the king’s boil (skin outbreak).
Hezekiah was promised 15 more years and protection from the king of Assyria. He asked Isaiah for a
sign and the prophet said
he could chose that either the shadow would go forward or backward ten
degrees.
The king asked that the shadow go backwards and hence it was reportedly
witnessed on the sundial of Ahaz (II Kings 20:
1 – 11).

I
call this amazing story the “Hezekiah
anomaly.” It requires that the Earth not only had to stop
spinning but
it also had to rotate backwards and then stop again and then resume
normal
rotation. As we’ve seen this is scientifically impossible. If it
happened it
would have resulted in the complete destruction of all surface life.

A Urban Myth

There
is a very crazy story that has circulated in different forms for quite
some
time. Its latest incarnation claims that some NASA scientists at GoddardSpaceFightCenter
were doing some
celestial mechanics via computer to determine the position and movement
of
planets as research for future satellite missions. The claim is the
scientists
came across an anomaly that showed there was a missing day in the past
and were
dumbfounded. A Bible believer was amongst them and he read them the
account in
Joshua 10 about the sun and moon standing still for about a day. He
then also
considered the story in II Kings to round out the missing interval to
exactly
one day! The scientists apparently accepted all of this as an
explanation.
There are some variations in the tale and sometimes even names are
included. It
often appears in the literature or web pages of some well meaning but
misguided
Christian groups as a purported proof of the biblical
accounts. [16]
The problems are paramount. Firstly NASA scientists completely deny the
story. Secondly there isn’t anyway to date the Joshua anomaly which had
to have
occurred on a specific
day in the
distant past. Further and most pertinent, it is
impossible for a computer to find such a missing day even if it
occurred. All
you can do is to post-dict planetary positions and compare them to
known
records. Such calculations using Newton’s
Laws and making comparisons are only possible for very recent
dates. [17] The further back in the past you go
the more complicated
become the calculations since you also have to include the
gravitational effect
of the other planets which alter planetary orbits (See my essay “The Motions of Our World”).
There are also no records of planetary positions to compare with such
extrapolations; it’s impossible. The story is an Urban Myth or Legend
and is
complete nonsense.

After Word

Everything I wrote about the Joshua
anomaly was to show how impossible it is
according the applied physics/astronomy. It was all done after the
manner of
the time honored thought experiment. In many instances physicist can’t,
for
various reasons, conduct real experiments so they play it out in their
imaginations. Albert Einstein was a master of the art but others also
gained
insights using this form. This isn’t to say my scenario isn’t error
free and
couldn’t be improved upon by mathematical modeling and computer
simulations.

I realize that true believers
will still insist the Joshua
and Hezekiah anomalies
were miracles and as such defy explanation. All so-called miracles are
not as
void of evidence. Imagine a case where a patient had a detected tumor
and after
a healing ritual it disappeared just prior to surgery. At least in such
cases
there are some facts such as the before and after details. There is
also much
uncertainty about what can occasionally go on inside our
bodies. [18]In cases of stories where there isn’t
any evidence the bar
of believability is even higher since there isn’t any way to
distinguish such
stories from myths. Stories such as the Joshua and Hezekiah anomalies
are even
more problematic. They require the suspension of so much of known
physics, such
as the like that it has never been seen, and contain nonsensical ideas
of how
our solar system operates. I simply have to call a spade a spade and
conclude
these accounts are myths. Even so, I still think this essay has
educational
value, even for true believers.We know that planets orbiting
stars at the right
temperature range for liquid water to exist is a primary
requirement for
the development of complex forms of life such as us. As astrophysicists
and
astronomers continue to search for extra-solar planets they hope to
find other
planets hospitable to advanced life. They have narrowed down the
requirements
of such special earth-like planets to a list that includes: a warm
benevolent
atmosphere, an abundance of liquid water, sizeable land masses and the
presence
of an adequate amount of bio-friendly elements such as carbon, oxygen,
hydrogen, nitrogen, phosphorous and sulfur. Most of these are heavier
elements
(hydrogen is the lightest) and these require much time to be formed
within
stars and in their end of life explosions, called supernovas. Also
complex life
requires a long time to evolve within benevolent conditions.
These planets must also be geologically active and that means they must
have a
spinning hot core of ionized plasma. As it turns out it is also the
engine that
powers tectonic activity. The earth’s crust and the ground we walk on,
sits on
top of floating tectonic plates. As the plates slowly move, collide and
even submerge
under one another, mountain ranges can be built up and oceanic rifts
widened.
The moving plates carry continents and islands along in their slow
drift and
cause earthquakes in the process. The cracks or fissures in earth’s
active
crust also allow pressurized magma to rise to the surface as volcanoes
spew it
out as lava along with deadly gases and heat. It sounds strange but
some
minimal level of volcanism and earthquake activity is a good thing. The
point
is if earth didn’t have a hot core, volcanoes and earthquakes then we
couldn’t be here.

Stars generate cosmic
radiation and planets
compatible with complex life must also rotate at an adequate velocity.
The
spin, as we’ve seen, is crucial in order for the plasma at the core to
generate
a protective magnetic field. There is also the need for such a planet
to have a
protective ozone layer to protect land life from dangerous solar ultra
violet
radiation. It is difficult to imagine complex land-based life evolving
without
these protections. As future scientists armed with advanced
technologies
conduct searches in the quest of locating extra-solar planets with
potentially
land-based advanced life forms [19]and those sighted don’t have an
adequate magnetosphere and
an upper atmosphere with a layer of ozone… they would be well advised
to move
on in the search! [20]

[2]“Elohim”
is a general term for God. It is said
to be a uni-plural noun such as the English words “church” and
“family.” It is
the plural form of the root “El” and implies Godcontains
more than one
being. Forms
of “El” are also found in Canaanite and Akkadian but its origin is
unclear.

[3]“Yahweh” is an accepted English vocalization of the Hebrew
God’s divine
name,
YHWH, referred to as “the Tetragrammaton.”
Early biblical Hebrew writing didn’t include or use vowels
and the name
became considered too sacred to utter. It is likely that no one knows
the
correct vocalization; although it is said that some high ranking Rabbis
know
it. It is supposedly a well guarded secret. Even when vowels were later
added
they had some very complex and different usages than those in the
English and
most other languages. Therefore the addition doesn’t really clarify the
issue. A
minority prefer the “Jehovah” vocalization. It was firstly used by
later
Christian Europeans but most scholars think it is incorrect.

[4]On July 4, 1054, Chinese sky watchers recorded a strange
bright light
in the
constellation known as the Crab. It was four times brighter than Venus
(when
the planet is viewed as brightest) and could be seen even in daylight
for 23
days. We know it was caused by a supernova, the explosion of a star. If
Joshua’s miracle really happened it would not have
gone by unnoticed by
many peoples. Yet there isn’t a single record outside of the Bible.

[6]All planets, including the earth are moving around the sun,
west to
east. The
stars, sun and moon alwaysappear
to move in the same direction
around earth, east to west. This is an illusion due to the rotational
velocity
and direction of the earth as it spins on its axis, west to east. The
common
apparent direction of the other planets around earth is also east to
west. At
times a planet can appear to stand stationary and begin move in the
opposite or
retrograde direction. Later it can appear to stop again and resume
direct
motion. These changes are the result of relative differences between
the speed
and position of the earth in its orbit compared to those other planets.
These
planets do not actually stop and change directions
in their orbits.

[7]It has been suggested that another way to create the
illusion of a
static Sun
would be if it began to move in a highly specialized way around the
solar
system. There isn’t any mechanism that could do this since it requires
the
presence of a greater gravitating body like a black hole that would
have to
come close enough to disrupt the sun’s path around our galaxy, the
Milky Way.
It is further problematic since as the Sun moves it also tows all the
planets
etc. along for the ride and such gravitational effect would disrupt the
solar
system as we know it. http://imagine.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/ask_astro/answers/970325g.html

[8]The moon actually orbits the earth west to east but
the
earth’s rotational
direction and velocity makes it appear to move east to west.
During an
earth day, the moon appears to rise in
the east and sets in the
west but it really takes about a month to orbit the earth. To make the
moon appear
to stand still the earth’s rotational speed has to slow down enough to
create
the stationary illusion. http://www.jimloy.com/astro/moon0.htm

[9]Mercury isn’t much larger than our moon and it is also
scarred by
craters from
past bombardments. Perhaps in the earlier more unstable universe, it
was
formerly a more distant planet or a planetary moon that was ejected and
later
captured by the Sun’s gravity.

[10]It is inclusive in the sense it must include the beginning
and end
points in
the said interval.

[11]The solid iron inner core moves slower than the secondary
more molten
nickel/iron one. This differential and interaction is said to be key to
generating the magnetic field. However there are still some unanswered
questions about the process.

[12]Mars hasn’t stopped rotating. It lost its magnetic field due
to some
unknown
internal dynamics. Perhaps its once molten inner core froze and the
planet’s
spin couldn’t generate a magnetic field.

[13]Minute amounts of water exist in some rocks. Scientists have
found
microbes
living inside rocks found in Antarctica.
These
algae only come to life and photosynthesize energy from the sun into
usable
forms for very short warmer periods of time yearly.

[14]When this class of submarine submerges they run off the
batteries. They
must
periodically surface to run the air using diesel engines to recharge
them.

[15]If it didn’t accelerate back up to the same constant
velocity then the
subsequent days would differ in length compared to earlier ones.

[18]I know of a few such cases. In one case a tumor disappeared
almost
overnight.
The doctors tend to think of these as “remissions.” The body can heal
itself
(i.e. put a disease into remission) but this usually takes a slower and
more
gradual route. In any case this isn’t in the same league as what is
alleged to
have happened in the Joshua & Hezekiah anomalies.

[19]Perhaps there might be some liquid water-based forms of life
in our
solar
system. The listed possible places include Mars and moons like Saturn’s
Titan
and Jupiter’s Europa. It has been suggested these might harbor some
under
ground/ice water microbial or perhaps even more complex forms of life.
So far
there has been some less than conclusive evidence in a
few meteorites
found on earth but determined to have originated from Mars. Future
exploratory
missions directly to these places may some day turn up some definitive
evidence.
It would certainly be a huge discovery!

[20]Of course one can criticize such consul as being limited by
an Earth’s
conditions view of complex land-based life. On the other hand it is
difficult
to imagine such life could exist in an
environment bathed by
cosmic rays. Of course one could argue they obviously eat them but Hollywood’s
ET, at least,
didn’t.